The Ombudsman’s Deputy helped families separated by the pandemic

Monika Šimůnková, the Deputy Ombudsman, and her colleagues dealt with several cases concerning negative impacts of government’s emergency measures on families. In cases in question, married couples coming from different countries were to be separated by the temporarily closed borders. Fortunately, in all cases mentioned bellow the Deputy and her colleagues were able to help them.

The first case was related to the partners living each at the opposite side of the Czech-Slovak boarders. Both of them have had severe health issues and one of the partners was dependent on the care of the other one – the woman was caring a lunch for her partner to the borders every day. After several consultations, an exception was granted to the woman so she could finally cross the borders to take care of her partner. Moreover, we cooperated with the Slovak Public Defender of Rights to facilitate the entry to the Slovak Republic.

In the second case we were approached by a pregnant woman who claimed to have difficulties with the entry of her husband (a South American state citizen) to the Czech Republic. The complainant was in a high-risk pregnancy and lived with her husband in his country of origin. They planned to return to the Czech Republic this spring. The complainant who is the citizen of the Czech Republic managed to arrive safely. However, her husband, even though he would not need to have visa to stay in the Czech Republic up to 90 days under the normal circumstances, was requested to present himself with a residence permit for more than 90 days as a consequence of the emergency measures in force at that time. The complainant’s husband was granted by the requested visa bud he would have to pick up his residence card in the Czech Republic only. This was, however, impossible under the current circumstances. The Ombudsman’s Deputy and her team luckily managed to break up this vicious circle and after the communication with the Ministry of the Interior the decision granting the complainant’s husband the temporary residence permit was delivered to him by other means. In the end, he could fly to the Czech Republic and be with his pregnant wife.

The last case concerned a woman having a Czech citizenship, her husband who was a third-country national, and their six-month-old baby. The family was living in the husband's Asian country of origin. Due to the measures related to COVID-19, the whole family was to arrive to the Czech Republic by a repatriation flight. However, the husband was informed by the Czech Embassy that he will not be allowed to enter the territory of the Czech Republic since he did not have a residence permit for more than 90 days (he had only a short-stay visa). Following the Deputy’s intervention the Ministry of the Interior clarified that the complainant, being the father of the Czech citizen, can enter the Czech Republic also on the basis of a short-stay visa. Thus, the repatriation of the whole family was finally ensured.